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[Pomorzany]

My heart goes out to all of you. It was a horrendous tragedy. The Israeli media are discussing it at length.

Jane Berman

[Bob Mueller]

You know what's really scary, is that I know of two college campuses in Ohio that have fulltime, 24/7, sworn and certified police officers, and won't let them carry firearms.

I suspect - or at least hope - that will change soon.

[Peg H]

You know what's really scary, is that I know of two college campuses in Ohio that have fulltime, 24/7, sworn and certified police officers, and won't let them carry firearms.

At one time PA colleges did the same.  The officers are now armed and extremely well trained in the use of deadly force.  I know of one officer who was a vital part of that change.  I'm married to him.

Peg H

[Ingrid]

Yes, Jim, I saw Lee's explanation.  No problem.

I just want to clarify that I wasn't asking for armed guards in my case.  The university needs to make sure that mental patients are only admitted to classes where the department and the instructor are aware of the problem.  In my case that wasn't done.  And with Cho, clearly neither his professors nor his room mates in the dorm knew.  That is inexcusable.

Ingrid

[penny]

I think I may have missed something here: Ingrid, were you STALKED?? When was this?? How terrible for you!

Penny

[Ingrid]

Bless you, Penny.  I don't believe I have ever mentioned this before.  It happened between about 75 and 85.  My stalker had no gun, thank God, and could not have gotten one legitimately.  But it was plenty scary. We changed our phone number, made it unlisted, and then moved to another city. The stalking continued on campus (he knew my office and where my car was parked) -- even though he no longer had any business being there. The mail also continued coming to my campus address.

Ingrid

[penny]

Whew. Nightmare material.
At least it's over for you. (How did it "go away"?)

Penny

[Ingrid]

I got the courage (or desperation) to confront him one day and threatened to call the police next time I saw him.  I didn't see him again.  Years later I read in the paper that he died in a traffic accident.

Yes, Livrescu was quite wonderful to step into the gunman's way.  It was heart-breaking.  But speaking as a normally selfish coward, I know that something takes over when your students are threatened.  You turn into a mother hen with chicks.  Happened to me once.

Ingrid

[Nellie]

  You turn into a mother hen with chicks.  Happened to me once.

Ingrid

You sure it wasn't more like a mother bear with cubs?   
You saying the fellow stalking you was a paranoid schizophrenic is scary.  I read an article by a psychologist saying that's what he believed Cho was, sighting a lot of his behavior as classic schizophrenic.  Others have said Cho was a psychopath, but one admitted it was hard to diagnose the dead.  It seems hard enough to diagnose the living, seeing how they only kept Cho a day or so at that psychiatric hospital.  It amazes me that someone so crazy was able to function in this world at all and even able to keep it together enough when he had to so as to fool experts about what he was really thinking.
Nellie

[Char]

Yeah, I'm new here and don't know the proper procedure, but this thread is about shooting.  I don't think I write mystery, but a friend who does says this site is loaded with gun experts and I have a question.  Char

[Bob Mueller]

Yeah, I'm new here and don't know the proper procedure, but this thread is about shooting.  I don't think I write mystery, but a friend who does says this site is loaded with gun experts and I have a question.  Char

Hi Char, welcome aboard. Hop over to the Weaponry board, and post your questions there, and we'll see what we can do.

[Chase]

I waited a few days to post, yet I'm sure some will view this as flaming.  It's not.  Most of us can disagree here while keeping our flamethrowers dialed down to "mild singe."

However, I’m glad the eastern media can’t reach the moon and wreck it, too.  I’m also very happy to learn they won’t have their way with gun control.

I applaud the residents of Virginia.  My ancestors hail from there, Pocahontas County, when it was the western frontier.  My heart is warmed that many are keeping that part of America alive, even though virtually surrounded by the enemy – city folks who think beef steaks and pork chops grow on Styrofoam trays in supermarket coolers.

Lee, with all due respect, those “hunters” you saw were no more indicative of real Virginians than fat cops munching their way out of Dunkin Donuts represent real police.

Let’s don’t get into hunting as a “sport,” because that ill-informed concept should have remained in England.  It certainly doesn’t belong here in the U.S.  My family from Virginia to Montana to Oregon has always hunted for food.  It’s no more a sport to us than is the harvest of corn.  We don’t carry guns for sport, either.

Can’t really blame you for thinking only trained police should be armed.  I feel the same way about writing.  It should be the sole province of those of us formally trained to do it.

Hmmmm.  Maybe it’s okay if neither of our wants are the way of world.  It seems those who shouldn’t write become impatient and write something worthwhile now and then.  Likewise, waiting around for those who claim to protect and serve to show up with their guns can last a lifetime.

Chase

[Chuck]

Gun control will work when criminals begin obeying the laws. When the Feds can absolutely, positively guarantee that criminals will no longer have guns, or that if I need the police to deal with a burglar that the police will instantly appear, then ask me to register or surrender mine. Right now, with millions of illegal aliens swarming into this country virtually unchecked, with half the crimes in NM being committed by illegal aliens, and with police response being 5 minutes and sometimes more, I and most of us here will not obey any sort of gun law.

Our 84 year old widow neighbor was mugged on the way to the post office, barely 100 yards from her home, a few months ago - by illegal aliens. She still walks to the PO every day, but now she carries her late husbands pistol, loaded and in plain view. This in a little village of barely 100 people. It was done by illegal aliens, and they were never caught (not surprisingly) since the police in this very rural area are overwhelmed with the rising crime rate caused by these illegal beings and couldn't get here for nearly 10 minutes.

Ten minutes is an eternity. Five minutes can be a lifetime when you need help right now. I can appreciate the knee jerk reaction to blame the instrument every time someone is killed, but some of us are living in the middle of an invasion, and I'll be damned if my home will be defenseless against these invaders.

[Chase]

Japan has been so successful in rooting out and destroying all citizen-owned firearms that at this time the hundreds of thousands of very expensive firearms manufactured there in underground shops are in the hands of criminals, many of whom are as criminally insane as was Cho Seung-Hui.

To keep the world from learning of its secret shame, the media which helped seize those guns in the first place now alters statistics so that any gunshot death is reported along with the thousands of unfortunate suicides.

Charles Whitman, the thugs at Columbine, Cho Seung-Hui, et al, are pitiful cowards.  A gun-free zone such as a school is their perfect, safe playground.

It’s why those disgruntled postal employees felt so secure in attacking fellow employees on-the-job.

We never see these heros of the dark side pulling their guns and shooting up a sheriff's qualification range.

They would never show up at a Montana single-action cowboy competition to scream their manifestos before blazing away.

If word were to get around that hero professors like Librescu and Couture-Nowak had concealed weapons permits, then the brave shooters made famous by media mongers would have to find more Amish elementary schoolrooms . . . perhaps Sunday school nurseries.

Chase

[Ingrid]

Let's compare gun deaths per capita in the U.S. with other civilized countries.

Lets' also remember that a lot of Brits choose to set their thrillers in the U.S. with an American protagonist. Their readers simply don't believe that this much violence and mayhem could happen in their own country.

Is this violence a characteristic of American people or is it due to the availability of guns?

Ingrid